Virtual network with Hyper-V

[Tricky_Dicky]

Hi,

 

Does anyone have a good guide on virtual networking in Hyper-V as I can't seem to get my head around it.Or can anyone explain to me how the best way of setting it up is?

 

Cheers

 

Rich

[ChrisMiles]

Can you be more specific as to what you are trying to achieve? Do you want an entirely virtual network for VMs separate from your physical lan? Do you want to connect your VMs to your physical lan? Are you using any VLANS?

[Tricky_Dicky]

Hi,

 

I'm trying to connect the virtual machines to the physical network. I'm currently experimenting with 2 physcial servers that both have Windows 2008R2 installed. One can access the network and be access just fine, it is acting as a DC in this test enviroment. The other machine just refuses to see the network and in the network maanger the physical machine reckons it is connected to a public network not the domain.

 

Any ideas?

 

Rich

[Tricky_Dicky]

Hi,

 

I'm trying to connect the virtual machines to the physical network. I'm currently experimenting with 2 physcial servers that both have Windows 2008R2 installed. One can access the network and be access just fine, it is acting as a DC in this test enviroment. The other machine just refuses to see the network and in the network maanger the physical machine reckons it is connected to a public network not the domain.

 

Any ideas?

 

Rich

[plexer]

What network settings are you using for the guests?

 

Ben

[ChrisMiles]

First you need to solve this networking issue with the second physical server. Have you configured your test DC with dhcp, or does your second server have a static IP on the same subnet as the DC? Have you added the second server to the new test domain as a member server? Check all these things and make sure that it's fixed before starting with virtual networks.

 

If you want a quick rundown on the different types of virtual networks:

 

External virtual networks share the physical network adaptors in your host and connect your VMs directly to your physical lan as separate devices with their own IP address etc.

Internal virtual networks allow the VMs to communicate with the host server on a seperate subnet from your physical lan. The VMs cannot communicate with your physical lan.

Private virtual networks allow multiple VMs to communicate with each other on a seperate subnet from your physical land. The VMs cannot communicate with your physical lan.

 

In this case it sounds like you want to add an external network using the Virtual Network Manager in Hyper-V Manager. Select the physical network adaptor on the host. Then make sure your VMs have a virtual network adaptor installed and that it is configured to use the new external network. Once you have done that the virtual machines will appear as if they were physical servers on your network and will use DHCP or require a seperate IP address within that subnet.

[Tricky_Dicky]

What network settings are you using for the guests?

In what sense? In terms of IP and DHCP, They are both set as static, I've tested plugging a few phyiscal machines into the same physical switch as the virtual DHCP and they get an address so that machine seems to be working but the second physical server doesn't see the first physical server.

[Tricky_Dicky]

Just so it's a bit clearer I have the following system installed.

2* Dell servers both connecting via a Brocade switch to an Equalogic box for hosting the VMs. This was setup by Dell and both physical servers can see, access and host the virtual machines on this SAN.

On Server 1 I have put DC-01. This is acting as AD, DNS, DHCP. It can see the rest of the little network, hand out DHCPs etc.

On Server 2 I have put on AD and while trying to dcpromo it can't find the domain controller on DC-01. Looking at the networking a bit more, the physical server says it is connected to an unidentified public network. I have no idea why it is doing this.

 

Thanks for the explanation on the network. I was under the impression you needed some sort of virtual switch as well as virtual ports. But it seems that if you want the virtual machine to connect to the physical network then just an external virtual network port for each machine is needed. Is that right?

Rich

[plexer]

Woah mind screw right there, one minute your mentioning virtual servers and hyper-v and now you're also talking about physical servers which is it?

 

Ben

[Tricky_Dicky]

Sorry

 

I think I'm getting mixed up with the whole system if I'm honest.

 

I'm trying to get my head around the physical and the virtual and getting tangled in cables at the moment.

 

What is the best way to start when it comes to setting it up from scratch (minus the SAN).

 

Rich

[RabbieBurns]

you need to configure both the internal and external networks on hyperV hosts/guests. Is your san connection via the brocade fiberchannel ? (I only ask as our san is fibrechannel connected and we use brocade switches)

 

Within HyperV on the host, if you go to Virtual Network Manager, you can specify which network card you want and to connect to the External Network. If you then look in Network Connections on your hyperv host, you will see there is a network adapter called Local Area Connection X - Virtual Network. This is the one you configure with the IP to talk to the external network.

[ChrisMiles]

But it seems that if you want the virtual machine to connect to the physical network then just an external virtual network port for each machine is needed. Is that right?

Rich

 

That is correct, yeah.

 

As for this public network issue, if your DC is virtual then my guess is your hosts won't be members of the domain and therefore they will not recognise the fact that it exists, as far as they will be concerned they are just stand alone servers sat on a network. In a live environment you would want a physical domain controller and for the hyper-v servers to be member servers on the domain. This would solve this issue.

 

In the mean time you should be able to use the Network and Sharing Center to change the network type to "Work" or something.

[Tricky_Dicky]

Thanks Rabbie,

 

Yes the SAN is via the fibrechannel which is nice because I can leave those well alone.

 

So from the beggining if I configure 2 ports on each physical machine with static IP addresses:

 

Server 1: Port 1: 10.125.124.01

Server 1: Port 2: 10.125.124.02

Server 2: Port 1: 10.125.124.03

Server 2: Port 2: 10.125.124.04

 

Then on Server 1: Create an internal Network with Internal Only

Create an External network connection which is connected to port 1 of the server.

In the virtual machine then tell it to use the virtual EXTERNAL network I just created?

 

Then repeat for server 2.

 

Does that sounds about right?

[RabbieBurns]

generally the internal network is for when you want the VMs to only have access to each other.

 

I only have external network configured, and set the VMs to connect via external.

 

I however also have a seperate connection between hosts on a dedicated 'heartbeat' network which is used for failover clustering with regards to live migration of virtual machines, should one host go down.

 

Hyper-V: Using Hyper-V and Failover Clustering

 

Download details: Step-by-Step Guide for Testing Hyper-V and Failover Clustering